Last Wednesday, Mark Gottlieb and Aaron Forsythe brought to fruition their plan to destroy Magic. Years of planning and plotting were finally announced to the world. In other news, they have also acquired a secret base on the moon, had lunch with Kim Jong-Il, and were behind Tarmogoyf the whole time. Their obvious goal is to drive Magic into the tank, such that the game, and by extension Wizards of the Coast, would go under, thus ensuring they would no longer have jobs, and would be free to pursue their true life’s goal, a circus starring Geriatric Trapeze artists.
Of course, the entire preceding paragraph is ridiculous. (The base is still in Colorado, awaiting transport to the moon). However, I plan to take a look at the rules changes from a perspective that absolutely none of the affected players can take: That of a player who hasn’t yet actually played.
As I’m sure I’ve mentioned before, I spent almost three years doing work for Wizards of the Coast teaching and attracting new players. I still fill this role at conventions and occasional Pro Tours ,notably U.S. Nationals 08 and Worlds 07, for Pro Tours, and GenCon, Penny Arcade Expo, and New York Comic Con. Hopefully, I’ll be at GenCon again this year as well (hint hint, Toby) doing it again. Having taught some hundreds of new players how to play the game, and having taken notes to try to keep improving the process, I’ll give you my two cents on the proposed changes.
Before I do, I want to give you a few reference links, which I believe are very important reading.
First, the announcement itself.
Following that, a Pro and Con discussion with the Great Zvi Mowshowitz is posted on Brian David Marshall’s Magic Blog. You can find it here.
Finally, our own Sean McKeown took a very reasoned look at the changes. I’m assuming most of you have read it, as it was on this very website on Friday, but for those of you who took a 3-day weekend, here’s that link.
I personally consider those the three best resources out there for the rules change.
Next, let me give you my personal reactions to the proposed changes.
1. Mulligans – They’ve tested this before, and it worked fine. I believe the time we get to play is far more valuable than the loss of maybe keeping a marginal hand if you’re opponent on the play mulligans into oblivion.
2. Terminology – Seems fine for me. I like having a name for the removed from game zone, but it does limit wishes. I think the only wish that’s legal in a non-eternal format is Glittering Wish, though, and that’s just Extended. So, meh.
I like Cast, Play, and Activate. The potential for confusion among new players with the word play having multiple meanings was a bit confusing, as I’ll show later. Battlefield, well, whatever. If it wasn’t this, it would be something else. I would have expected something slightly more elegant, possibly with less syllables, but again, whatever.
I like the change of beginning of the end step, as that confused a lot of players, the semi-casual crowd that comes to FNM, buys cards at shops, and doesn’t really care to learn the rules too closely. They play for fun, and the store and FNM gives them an outlet. This will be clearer for shenanigans, involving less judge calls, I hope.
3. Mana- The change of Mana burn makes things simpler, and overall I like it. Mana pools emptying more often makes mana denial more powerful, which seems against Wizards of the Coast’s policy of not empowering un-fun tactics (like LD and mana denial, etc.) Players like to play their spells, and this change of Mana pools emptying makes mana denial more powerful. I don’t think it has a big effect on tournament players, and frankly is just cosmetic to me. As we’ll see later though, it had some new player thoughts on it.
4. Token Ownership – Good.
5, 6, 7. Combat – Mixed bag. Damage not using the stack, I’m actually fine with. I know a lot of people hate it, but it seems fine with me. It changes the way combat works, obviously, but I don’t think it drops complexity. Overall, my initial hunch was that it would make magic easier to pick up. Lifelink changing was also a good change, for the same reason; Players learning want to believe it works the way it now does, i.e. saving you from death.
It’s the blockers bit that bothers me. It seems very unintuitive. Not being able to damage multiple blockers however I want is bad. Lining up blockers adds complexity unnecessarily, as well as confusion. I can only imagine how often there will be miscommunication over how blockers were ordered. It’s not loads, but probably more than currently, i.e. > 0. More importantly, Ordering Blockers is not intuitive. This isn’t a Jackie Chan movie; the bad guys won’t line up and wait for you to dispatch them in order. Plus, this would allow us to not have to rewrite the Deathtouch rules. (Ironically, now I want to see a Jackie Chan creature with the Touch of Death…)
Now, on to our little science experiment. As a full-fledged Nerd (D&D, Comic Books, Card Games, Board Games, etc.) I gathered together a group of 5 friends who do not play Magic. They have played card games before, certainly. In fact, a few of them helped me play-test my forthcoming Standalone card game, so they’re certainly familiar with hard-lining rules systems. They have all had experience in Role-Playing Game systems (which are thousands of times more rules intensive than Magic. We have a few rulebooks, but less than 200 pages total. D&D 3.5, at its conclusion, had over 10,000 pages of source material. And that’s not counting 3rd party material.) They have also all had experience playing card games, mostly games like Munchkin, Chez Geek, and other semi-standalone card games.
So, having gathered this ragged band of potential players, I set about showing each of them the various rules. We played out some portions of games to simulate the learning experience, and I’ve annotated some of their responses here.
Mulligans – Mulligans was pretty unanimous as improving the game. From a new player perspective, I also think it’s very strong. People want to play the game, not wait around before deciding if they’re going to play. Anything that gets them playing faster is obviously good. Here’s my favorite quote on mulligans:
“It seems like the only occasion you would have the extra time to wait around for your opponents to mulligan is un-timed games, which I imagine would be casual games. I think that if you were playing in a timed tournament, you would want to get on to actually playing your opponent. This seems like a policy that used to favor the underdog, and now is more balanced.”
Intriguing insight, in that the player with the advantage wants parity here. It almost felt as if he was saying “The old mulligan favored worse players, because they could sit back and watch their opponent shoot themselves in the foot.” Either way, everyone liked the new method, because it meant they could actually get on with playing faster. Therefore, I call this a good move.
Terminology – This was not as strongly liked as I thought it would be. I wrongfully assumed that the players would enjoy more flavor in the game, but it wasn’t always the case. Some of the players really enjoyed it, but others were indifferent. I thought that this was one of the easier changes that would benefit the cause of drawing new players to the game, but it doesn’t seem to be the case. Here are a few quotes:
“Battlefield feels a little childish and simple for a game that is obviously more complex otherwise. Exile and removed from game really are the same thing. Exile means removed, basically.”
“I like that they changed the wording on play to be less multi-definitional. Battlefield and Exile seem a little bit off, compared to other terms in the game. It feels artificial, I guess.”
“I really like having more descriptive terminology, it adds to the flavor of the game!”
For the record, 2 of the 5 really liked the change, which is about the same amount as people who typically dig the flavor part of the game. It didn’t really convert any others, and the term Battlefield was actually somewhat disliked. I call this change a wash. I don’t think it helped or hurt, really, just changed things. The people invested in the flavor probably like it more, but not so much more than before. The people who don’t care, well, they don’t care, and there are a few players who also don’t actually like the change.
This feels like the old Mark Rosewater line: If you don’t like it, it’s probably not for you. Just like cards aren’t for everyone, apparently sometimes flavor and rules aren’t for everyone, too.
3. Mana – This was a subject that went strangely. The sentiment seemed to be the exact opposite of what I thought personally. While I liked the mana burn rule, and was skeptical about the Pools emptying, our group went in another direction.
On the topic of Mana Pools emptying, one player almost exactly quoted Sean McKeown, calling it a “glitch in the rules that we’re exploiting. Complaining about its loss is like complaining when Word of Warcraft patches an error. Yes, your Shaman is less powerful, but it’s supposed to be.” Overall, they all seemed to be in favor of tighter Mana restrictions.
On the topic of mana burn, there was some disagreement. There was some correlation between flavor and stance. Here’s a relevant quote:
“Look, it’s pretty well established in fantasy literature that drawing in Magical power without expending it has consequences. And yet, now it doesn’t. Bad form.”
In rebuttal, another said “Who cares? We’re not establishing the fundamental base of Fantasy literature, we’re playing a game. Besides, you don’t have to follow the rules. How else do you get new stuff if you always follow the old?”
Interestingly, this topic probably had the most debate. Therefore, I can’t call it a win or a loss. Very interesting, though.
Tokens – The entire group basically said “Huh?” This pretty much has no effect on initial reaction, but I can imagine that as they learn the game later, making the rule work the way it’s feels like it should is just one less chance to scare them away. So, this one is a win.
Combat – More interesting debate, but overall, most of it was pretty clear. The stacked damage was universally derided as silly. “Throw punch. Stop time. Enhance body size. Remove all parts of creature except the force of the fist. Watch opposing creature die from non-existent fist. Quit game for D&D.” Once I explained how the rest of the game used the stack, it seemed a little more palatable, but here’s another quote that was pretty head on.
“It seems like the rule was put in there to help everyone learn the stack, which is fine. But the game has grown beyond ‘one stack to rule them all.’ Great games can support more.”
Harsh, but hard to refute, personally. I know many new players didn’t like the way that combat worked when they were being taught. Almost every new player I have ever taught believed that the damage should work the way it does now. So, it’s hard to argue that it’s not intuitive for new players.
Moving on, Lifelink was universally liked.
“It feels like it should be a lifesaver. I shouldn’t die while I’m about to be healed, especially when the healing should happen at the same time as the lethal damage.”
There was some disappointment about it not stacking anymore, and that it takes away some of the cool stuff it could do before (“Gaining enormous amounts of life is cool.”) but most believed it is probably better this way.
Declaring Blockers, on the other hand, was universally derided. Let me share a few more highlights:
“Hey, Grizzly Bears, wait your turn. I’m fighting an elf first. Geez, wild animals have no sense of acting proper.”
“If the bad guys are just going to line up single file, they shouldn’t call it the Battlefield, they should call it the Narrow Hallway.”
“Seriously, I have to line these guys up, and then knock them down one at a time? Has anyone who makes this game ever been in a fight? Besides, I thought the idea was to make the game simpler and more intuitive. This is the opposite of both of those.”
“You know, you don’t always want to kill each one. Sometimes, there’s a bigger mission at stake.”
“Man, it just seems like it’s unnatural. It doesn’t feel like its how the game should work. It’s wasting time in the game, too. It just feels weird, compared to the rest of the game.”
So, across the board, the group disliked having to assign damage sequentially. Every single one of them thought the first system of block, damage wherever you like, was a better system. Furthermore, by keeping that system, they pointed out you can get rid of the stupid “ordering blockers” rule that adds unnecessary complexity and busy-work to the game.
Deathtouch wasn’t really discussed. We mentioned it, but the group was still pretty hung up on the new idea of a Narrow Hallway. One person mentioned that Deathtouch feels like it got stronger, if they get to ignore damage assignment.
So, there you have it, a small group of new players impressions of Magic. Will it help draw in new players? Yes, I do. Some of the areas they cleaned up caused some confusion amongst new players. But I think that they didn’t improve their chances as much as they could have, especially in the area of ordering blockers.
Until next time, this is Jeff Phillips, reminding you: Don’t make the Loser Choice